Face and Body / Colin Jones Univ of London

Face and Body (HI259) - Course Rationale

[c] http://www.history.qmw.ac.uk/staff/jones.htm

i) Aims and Objectives

1. The course will offer a cultural history of the face, set against changing conceptions of mind and body in western Europe from around 1450 to around 1914.

2. You will be encouraged to think historically and analytically about a familiar object about which you will probably not have thought before in historical terms.

3. The course will be interdisciplinary and will encourage you to span the divide between different approaches and disciplinary domains, generally within the purview of social and cultural history, the history of medicine and sience, the history of art and literary analysis.

4. Changing representations of the human face and body will be at the heart of the module. In addition, a particular concern will be to highlight the ‘sciences of the face’, from early modern then Lavaterian physiognomy through to race theory, Darwinism, and Lombrosian, Galtonian and other theories of human difference

5. The course will close with consideration of how Freudian theory altered the perceived relationship between face, mind and body, and will offer a historical perspective on the reemergence of ‘sciences of the face’ in the late twentieth century.

6. Throughout, as well as being encouraged to approach questions from a wide range of disciplinary angles, you will also be urged to use a wide gamut of approaches, visual as well as scribal.

7. Many core sources are available on the Web, and you will be expected to use the Web creatively and productively on all aspects of the course.

ii) Expected Learning Outcomes

By the end of the module you should:

• … have gained a further development of study, writing and communication skills
• … have gained familiarity with a wide range of sources, primary and secondary, relating to the face and body in western medicine and culture from c. 1450 to c. 1914
• … have experienced a range of approaches, conceptual frameworks and methodological procedures for understanding the face and body (these to include medicine, surgery, painting, photography, literary analysis, psychoanalysis, sciences of the face such as physiognomy, etc)
• … have expanded your historical skills, drawing on visual as well as scribal sources, some of which will be accessed electronically.